In the press, the major part that is reported is the unexpectedness of a situation. This is to shock the audience in either reading the news or watching it. This is only one of 13 points that the press follow in capturing the audience’s attention in the news.
For statistics 65% of over 15 year olds reads a daily news paper, this is a high percentage of people that are influenced by what news is written in the newspaper. However The Mirror group owns 45% of the newspaper industry. This mass control of the industry would make the audience believe that the newspaper industry is bias as the opinions and views of the situation are controlled by one major controller. In one case Rupert Murdoch did not agree to some views expressed by the Labour party, and therefore made huge claims against the party to make the audience ‘hate’ that party. This is one way of manipulation that the press can control. This could follow closely to the term of Ideology, as this set belief of the individual can affect the audience, this can also be recognise as being deviant. This applies to Northcliffe Media, as they have a combined readership of 7 million people. This creates a major impact as majority of readers will be affected by the reporter’s opinions of that news that day. This makes the audience want to think and feel, the same way the reporter does about the situation.
Another point that the press usually take on news that will be frequently used again in the media and know that it will keep audiences interested in that one story line. These news headlines generally on the front cover; this could also be related to unexpectedness as it will make the audience read more of the story. This could apply to both Tabloid newspapers and Broadsheets, depending on whether the news is classed as gossip or factual news.
However, the one part that the press cannot control is the factors that have been listed by the PCC (Press Complaints Commission). Some examples are: Harassment, Discrimination, Privacy etc. This will make the press stop reporting news that does not have consent from the person being reported. Although this does not seem to be effective as the press continually repeat the same offence, as they want to report the best news stories of the day.
In conclusion, the press have majority control on what is reported and not reported in the news. The news in which are not reported are the ones that will affect anyone e.g. relatives emotionally. Although the news paper usually report this type of news to begin with before it is reported and those 65% of newsreaders will see the news of that situation anyway.
